Pre-World Cup

The World Cup is cominnnggggg! The first game is on the 12th of this month and unfortunately, the missionaries have not been liberated to watch the games... We will be switching our study hours to the hours of the games. :( But we'll see if that doesn't change. São Paulo has already gone into party mode preparing for the games. The streets are painted, banners are up, and the drunks are out. Lots of barbeques and soccer talk here. Also, the metros have been on strike for the past week and a half, which has put a damper on my Sister Leader duties. No divisions this week because we are out of options (except our feet) for how to get to the other areas. Everyone is struggling with this metro strike. It's becoming more and more difficult to get investigators to church, get to our meetings, and lots of other things...

 

 

On Tuesday I went to the dentist. It was painful, but don't worry, it was free. I've also been banned officially from eating popcorn. It's a hard-knock-life. Today we are suppsoed to be getting transfers, BUT we still have not gotten the call yet... I'm pretty sure I'll be staying here in the Bosque ward until the end of my mission (there's an END?!), so I'm pretty excited.

Sorry the email is so short, things were a little slow this week due to the cup festivities.

com amor,

sister hargrove

Mais 20 Semanas!

Another week ooofffffffff... everything falling through #welcometothemission Litereally everything. Appointments with investigators, lunches with members, divsions with sisters, meetings with leaders. everything.  We are stugglebusin' it for sure. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday our plan A, B, and C to everything fell through, so we wandered around, got to know our area a little more, found a quaint little favella, and made street contacts after street contacts after street contacts until a member found us far from home and gave us ride to the chapel. This area needs some serious work. The missionaries before me taught a lot of eternal investigators, which kind of sucked for us because we're realizing that these people like because of the following reasons... we have blue eyes, we're foreign, we have an accent, I know how to make cookies, and sometimes I show them cute little mormon message videos.... and the gospel? nope. So we are rebuilding our teaching pool right now and forcing the members to help us out by guilt triping them into giving us references (what?) and teaching them how to open their mouths and share their happiness! 

This past Tuesday, we had a party in our house. So all of the new american missionaries have to make a trip to the federal police department soon after they get into the field to pick up their visa. And since our house/area is in the central part of our mission, they all get to sleep at our house. Soooooo, TEN sisters sleeping in our house on Tuesday. TEN. It was a hot mess of pizza, blow up mattresses, and mission gossip. Woof. It was a looonngggg night. BUT I got to be reunited with my Chilean companion from a couple transfers ago, Sister Cañas, woohoo! Another supla of sisters stayed in our area and did some street contacts for us and found two people that would let us teach them in their house. We went to contact one yesterday. ot to his house and were greeted by a cute little group of gang members smoking pot. yes. We talking to the guys mom and she told us to come back on Monday. While we were walking away from the house, me and my big mouth decided it would be a good idea to invite the pot-smoking-gang-members to church on Sunday and that if they would let Him, Jesus Christ could change their lives. Woops. They politely thanked me for the invite and then told me that the area I was in was dangerous and that they are part of such-and-such gang and that people are killed right where I was standing. Then one of the dudes said, "organiiiiiiiized crimmmmme." And that was enough for me, I said #thanksBYE and took off as fast as my sister missionary shoes could take me. 

We have a really, really, really awesome investigator, C. She's in er 30's and was a referance from the stake presidents wife. She has two kids and is pregnant, but a widow. She is AWESOME. And super sweet. She has lived a really hard life and she is really growing and progressing in the gospel. The coolest thing is that the relief society and the primary are taking really good care of her and her family. Her kids LOVE church. And C is preparing for baptism. :)

 

This week we also had our last conference with President and Sister Tanner. Everyone cried, felt the Spirit and sang 'God Be With You 'Till We Meet Again', the official goodbye hymn. I am so grateful for them as my mission mom and dad. They have changed my life and I am more than excited to welcom President and Sister Broadbent into the mission and send President Tanner off to his new calling.

13 Months!

Transfers are this coming week. Hoping to continue in the Bosque ward! :) Still waiting for letters...

Sister Nicole Hargrove

Missão Brasil São Paulo Sul

Rua Dr. Luis da Rocha Miranda, N°159
8° Andar
São Paulo, SP
Brazil/Brasil
CEP 04344-900

Com Amor,

Sister Hargrove

So we have this investigator named Sandra. She's in her 40's and from Chile and doesn't speak Portuguese, just Spanish. So I've been doing my best to remember everything I learned from high school Spanish Class (nothing) and we've been teaching her. She's here visiting her cousin, who's an active member in our ward. She had a really great experiance in Church this past Mother's Day Sunday. We get to Church and she doesn't understand anything for the first two house (Rel. Soc. and Sun. School). Then we get to Sacrament Meeting and she jsut starts to understand everything. It was awesome and truly the gift of tongues. She turns to me and her cousin, with tears in her eyes and says, "Everything they're saying is just for me!" It was so cool. We taught her last night with a kid in our ward that just got back from his mission in Ecuador, so his Spanish is a little better than mine. We taught her the Restauration and it went really well! Pray for her!

This past Friday, we had an interesting experiance... We had just gotten home (on time! 9 o'clock.) and about five minutes in to our daily planning session we hear a bunch of noise outside out front window and a man yelling "Rapido! Rapido!" ("Fast! Fast!") we go over to the window, open the curtains and see a car parked in front of our house and three or four men robbing the people in the car at gunpoint. "Sister! I saw a gun!" We quickly shut the curtains and the car eventually drove off after about a minute. Can I just tell you about my testimony of the missionary curfew. THAT RULE WAS INSPIRED! For sure. We are home. On time. Everyday. Nothing else sketchy has happened since that incident. So all is well, mom.

We have another really awesome investigator that was a referance from our Stake President's wife. Her name is Cibele, she's super cute and pregnant with her third, and is in her 30's. She came to Church this Sunday and loved it. Her daughter also adored the Primary class. She's really great because you call tell that she is really searching for truth, not only for her, but for her family as well. It's really sweet.

I'm in charge of making breakfast for our zone tomorrow. Someone let it out that I know how to cook. So we'll see how that goes. This week should be really great because we are going to have a mission conference with Elder Anderson! Everyone is super excited. My new calling is going well. I got my first dose of dealing with some sweet sister drama. But, no worrie, I told them to suck it up and get to work. :)

I love my mission and y'all too!

com amor,

Sister Hargrove

This week was just dandy, but let's start with today... As Sister Machado and I were anxiously making our way through companionship study and trying not to think about the millions of different outcomes of transfers, we get a phone call. 

Me: "Sister? Why is President calling?"
Sis.: "I don't know, answer it!"

Me: "Oi Presidente!"

President: "Hi, Sister Hargrove, so I just wanted to let you know and your being transferred..."

Me: "...and..." (because president doesn't just call to tell you you're getting transferred.)

President: "...and we would like to call you as a Sister Training Leader."

Me: "What the... ?!"

So it's officially official. I've been called to serve as a Sister Training Leader. Which is basically a Sister Zone Leader who is in charge of two or three zones of Sisters. I get to do exchanges with the sisters every week. Which meens training them, and seeing how they are ajusting to missionary life and how I and the other mission leadership can help them. I'm pretty excited, I won't lie. I'm reall going to get to know the mission going to all the different areas and all the awesome sisters that we have in our mission. And, selfishly saying, I will have the opportunity to grow and learn a lot from those other sisters. For sure, I feel super inadequate. There are a LOT of really great sisters that I think would do a way better job than me. BUT, not only is President trusting in me, but Heavenly Father is as well. And with less than six months left on the mission, there's no way I'll let Him down. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_S3TI4bYerU

Don't forget about me on Mother's Day! I'll be skyping! 

See ya'll in six months!

Love,

I've been transferred!

NATE. That is so stinking cool that you're going to EFY at BYU. I loved it when me and jasmine and shay and walker and jared all went. Make the best of it, Nate!  You'll learn a lot about the Savior, but also have the time of your life if you let yourself!

 

This week was exciting. I didn't get any mail this week, but it's just because we haven't gotten a mail delivery in forever. BUT, my new and improved and great Ward Mission Leader works right next to the Mission Office and will be passing by there on his way home from work today to pick us up and brand spanking new box of copies of the Book of Mormon and hopefully our letters and packages. He served a mission so I think he realizes how important they are to the missionaries. :)

 

As you've probably already realized, I've been transferred. It was SAD, to say the least. But, I'm practically on the other side of the street. I'm officially in the Rudge Ramos Stake, Assunção Ward. But, funny story... I already know a lot of the members from being in this zone my first transfer being so close these past four transfers. and I know the Bishop. So Bishop Dani is the brother-in-law of my bishop back in São Bernardo. I saw him everytime we had lunch over there, which was jsut last week where we were JOKING, "Hey Bishop, if you're lucky, maybe I'll get transferred to you're ward." hahaha HA. Jokes on me. Here I am. Looks like I'll be seeing a lot more of the great Boscolo Family... and São Bernardo. I actually think that I might stay in São Bernardo for my entire mission! I also got a new junior companion, Sister Cañas. She's 19, from Santiago, Chile, and has four months on the mission and super cool... The only problem is that she doesn't speak a whole lot of Portuguese, a LOT of Spanish. Looks like I'll be learning Spanish as well. Which is fine, because at this point I understand both languages, I just don't want to get them all confused, because they're so similar. 

 

I got the call on Monday morning and immediately started calling and writing letters to my beloved members, here in SBC 4. They set up a nice going away party with pizza and people and pictures for Sister Marino and I. We all cried and reccounted happy memories and everyone gave us great words of wisdom and invited us to come back with the family. That means YOU, family. You have an official invite to the SBC 4 Ward. Parabems. If this gets posted on my blog and Vinicius is reading this... I miss you and your family! I can't wait to come back and visit! Ask Sister Alves to show the video we made for you!

 

This week, we had a great, exciting week of work. The first day we went to visit one of the investigators, Lilian... and I saw the grossest thing I've ever seen on a human body. She had this HUGE thing on her leg, a tumor or something and she was sick, couldn't walk with a swollen, hot, red leg with a fever. So obvi, we dragged that woman to the hospital. Which was an adventure! I've been in a few Brazilian Hospitals, but just to visit, not with an actauly patient. So what they do, is after 100 years of waiting (or like 4 and a half hours) they call you into the office of the doctor and she's writes you a prescription of what you need to get better and sends you on your way to the treatment center, where they hit everyone up with and IV and whatever else they need. In Brazilian Hospitals everyone gets an IV. Then you go to the pharmacy to pick up your happy pills and they send you on your way. So back to Lilian, she got prescribed two drugs and a pimple popping. I don't actaully know the name of what was on her leg, but whatever it was, it needed to be popped. I'm counting my blessings that I didn't have to go in with her while she got it popped because it was real nasty and pusy and bloody... yuck.

 

 On a more spiritual note... We had some great lessons and helped a lot of people this week. First, Rosa. The Sisters found her knocking doors and have been helping her to stop smoking. We met with her this past week and shared a scripture and our testimonies with her, and then I did something I've never done before. I asked her to hand over the ciggs. I felt a little bit like an inmate because I told her that I would trade all the ciggs she had for some oranges (rumor has it, because oranges are acidic, it helps get the nictotine out of your veins easier or something like that). After a little push, she accepted, and she has officially been smoke free since Saturday night and will be baptized and confirmed on Sunday. Pray hard for Rosa! It was definitely a spirit filled lesson. There's no way that I could have said the things I did so boldy with out God's help.

 

I had one of the most precious lessons with some less actives this week as well. We went to visit Wesley, Wellington, and Wiliam (true story) and while we were chit chatting, I started asking Wesley about his baptism and what he remembered. He said that he remembered being scared of how deep the wated was, but that when he came back up out of the water he felt so clean and light. It was such a sweet and sincere testimony. We asked Wellington to say the prayer. He was nervous so I told him I would help him. I started and he kind of filled in the blanks. It was such a sweet prayer. He said that he was gratful for the missionary visit and he prayed that he and his borthers could all have the desire to come back to church.

 

love love love you all

sister hargrove

Toucans!

On Tuesday we were waiting at the busstop to go to District Meeting and I saw two toucans fly overhead and land in the tree right next to us. Sometimes I forget that I'm in Brazil and then things like this happen. lol.

I got a package from y'all on Tuesday as well. I cried when I opened it, in front of the whole zone, it was great. I also got a letter from Sister Johnson. Thanks for the Burts Bees and hand santi and all the other goodies. I gave a lot of the candy to my zone and now they all love 'mama hargrove.' :)

We had interviews with President Tanner on Tuesday as well. It was really great. I really don't know how I lucked out with such a great mission president/sister.

where in brasil is sister wishon going?

I scared Sister Alves real bad this week. She was in the bathroom before bed so I turned off all the lights and made my blanket look like I was still in bed. Then I waited aroiund the corner of our bedroom. When she felt around for our dresser to walk to her bed and found a person instead, she screamed bloody murder and woke everyone up. :)

So this week for english class we did a phone activity. Everyone drew a situation out of the bag that they had to do over the phone with us. For example, order a pizza, ask someone on a date, sign up for a football team... it was super funny.

Represa Billings

Represa Billings - This week we went on an awesome adventure tooooo... Billings! Billings is the farthest and most deserted part of our area and full of country house. It was awesome.Definitely reminded me a little bit of the tropical version of home.Banana trees instead of pine trees. Packs of stray dogs everywhere. But anyways, we knocked doors and talked to people. I saw a dalmation. We hanve return appointments... successsssss. We'll go back one day this week.

Flood - So we had the most insane rainstorm this week. We have crazy thunder and lighting everyday, but the rain in]s just insane. The streets flood everyday. All the cars just pull into a gas station and wait for it to pass. One day the drain on our balcony got clogged with dirt and hair and who knows what else and flooded our house completely. we had about an inch of water in my bedroom, wich flooded into the other sisters bedroom, which then made a waterfall down the stiars, into the kitche and then back out side... needness to say... our tile floors are spotless and our drain is clean now.

Drought - This area is dead. We are hardly teaching right now. No one wants to hang out with us. Everyone's busy or vacationing...

Cookie - So we have a dog.  She's homeless. Her name is cookie. Everytime we work in this area called Terra Nova II, she finds us and follows us for the rest of the day. While we're talkig to people on the street, she lays down right next to us and waits. Even when we have lessons inside houses, she just sleeps until we're done. We've been trying to fins a home for her. Sister Alves named her cookie.

My Dream - This past week I had a completely terrible dream. I dreamed that I got off my mission after serving 18 months, went home, and was still at the same Portuguese level that I am now. But that's not even the worst part.In my dream, I was unsatified with my mission. I felt sad and like I could have done something more. I had wasted my 18 months as a missionary. It was definitely a wake up call. Not that I am wasting time now, but there are always things that we can be doing better. I have never felt worse in my whole life than I did in that dream. This week when Elder fix-it came to clean up our flood mess, he told us that the mission is one of the only things that you don't get to do over again. You get one shot, and then that's it! So that's a year and a half of working harder than you ever have before and getting a lot of doors slammed in your face. I still wouldn't trade it for the world.

ctr

love,

sister hargrove

ONE MORE TRANSFER

On Monday this week we got transfer calls (ready to do ONE MORE TRANSFER in the SBC?) and then Tuesday we went to the reeping. I am training... again... a brand spanking, new, fresh out of the MTC missionary. Her name is Sister Alves, she's 20, annnddd BRAZILIAN! Woohoo! She's from the capital, Brasilia and super cool. She has 2 weeks on the mission. holy heck. I'm a little nervous because I will be her first impression of the mission. yikes. No worries though. I'll do my best and Heavenly Father will make up the rest. Todo vai dar certo.

In other news, Brasil is drying up. In more ways than one. It's been over 90 degrees for the past week and I am frying. Also, I think I've talked to about everyone living in the St. Bernard, and as it turns out, the greater population in content being baptized when they're not old enough to eat solid food and then never stepping foot into a church again. fetch. But all is well. I'm still happy. But seriously... our teaching pool is dwindling... so if anyone has any friends in the greater São Bernardo area that are itching to hear the gospel, send them my way.

Let me tell you about my favorite missionary moment this week. It was a wet one. Sooooo, I lost my unbrella. And it turns out that my raincoat just doesnt do the trick when you're being pelted with raindrops. It was pouring. And I was completely soaked. To the point where I squeezed my skirt fabric and water dripped out. #sisterlife. We walked up Mt. Everest and tried to visit this less-active woman who I had never heard of. We called up to her apartment. A cute, quiet little woman answered the door. We chatted for a bit and then I asked her if she had ever served a mission. She served a mini-mission for six months, so we chitch-chatted about that for a bit as well. I felt prompted to share a scripture about prayer with her. So I shared the small story in 1 Nephi when his brother had caught him with cords and were going to kill him. Nephi said a quick fervent prayer and was made free. She then shared with us a great experiance that she had had with a simple, sincere prayer. Tears were shed. The Spirit was felt. Success. Through small and simple things, great things are come to pass. It all starts with opening your mouth. She said with tear in her eyes, "it's been a long time since the missionaries have thought to visit me." and then invited us to come back.

This week we lost one of the greats. Elder Correa, my zone leader for the past three transfers headed back to the land of Churrasco. It always makes me nervous when people go home because I know that my time will come to leave the mission field and enter into the mission field back home. Not because I feel like I won't be ready to go, or because I think I won't have finished what I need to do, But because this work is marvelous. Despite all the trials, hard days, rain, I've never been happier to be hastening the work than I am right now. On our way back from Christmas Conferance I was talking to him about how he felt about the mission and whether he had any advice. He said three things. 1. Be obedient. 2. Don't waste time... especially fighting with your companion. 3. Work with the members. It was a testimony to me that this really isn't up to me. We're in your ward to help you with missionary work. not the other way around. every member a missionary.

Have a great week, Family.

Love,

Sister Hargrove

6 months on the mish!

Oh boy... sounds like Nate is just a PEACH. Boa Sorte. AH! That's so cool that you've been talking to my members! You've actually been talking to their 12 year old son. He came up to me after Sacrament yesterday and was like "SISTER HAHA! [which is what the ward calls me because no one can prounounce/likes to say my name] I TALKED TO YOUR MOM YESTERDAY!"It was awesome! He said he's been putting everything through google translator haha but that's way cool. We have a FHE with them every single week and I just love them. It's really awesome because they were less-active when we got into the area and now they come to church every Sunday! The family is Katia and her husband, N, and their three kids and two chihuahuas. I'm glad that President Most finally received my card! Glad to hear that dad is doing good... Haven't heard from him in a while... HINT! I haven't been sending a lot of pictures lately because my card reader won't work and so I have to find my camera cord, but I will send pictures next week of our baptism and everything...

Last P-Day we went to the happiest place on earth... AKA Rua 25 de Marzo. It's a huge street lined with shops that sell tons and tons of anything your could imagine for super cheap. Heavenly. Believe it or not, I actually didn't buy anything... Partly because my money is a little low at the moment because I just had to pay our water/energy bill and partly because I was so overwhelmed by all of the different things I wouldn't have been able to choose! The streets there were PACKED. hundreds and hundreds of people. literally.

Last Tuesday I went on Splits with a sister in our zone, Sister W. She's from Georgia and is 19 and I freaking love that girl. I got to spend the night and day in her area and it was way fun! She's only been here for 3 weeks so her portuguese was a little... limited... so I had to talk a LOT, which was good. Definitely helpe me to step up my Portuguese a little bit. It's always really nice to go on splits with other missionaries because it helps you to get out of the 'pattern' of the transfer. Sister Wilcox taught me a lot of really great things. It was such a testimony builder to me to see her on her mission and so dedicated to the work. Missionary Work is truly the most important work that you could be doing right now.

Wednesday I got to go back to my area with sister M and it was SO stinking hot. Actually, it probably wasn't even that hot, it's just so stinking humid her that when you step outside you're pretty much instantly drenched in sweat. awesome. we were walking to go and try and visit some less actives near our house and we decided to stop by a members house and let her know about the baptism on saturday. literally 3 minutes after we entered her house, the rain started. But it wasnt just a sprinkle, it was hard, big, fat, noahs ark raindrops. in 10 minutes the streets were rivers and flooded with water and the thunder was so loud it made the house shake! AND THEN -  - the hail. oh my heck. hail the size of ping pong balls started pelting the house. it was nuts. obviously we stayed in the house until it stopped because that would have punched holes in my umbrella! After that we had our Baptismal interview at the capella!! G was interviewed and found worthy to be baptized and was so excited. He was beaming. Great day. It was also a special day for me because I turned 21 1/4. Happy Birthday to me!

Thursday was my SIX MONTH BIRTHDAY on the mish! I can't believe it! I actually feel like I have no time left! I'm kind of praying that Prophet Monson will announce next general conference that sisters can stay for 2 years because i don't think ill ever want to leave Brazil. But, anyways. Thursday was kind of NUTS. Let me explain... We went to lunch a a members house who lives an hour away on foot, then we had to go fnd our map (that i lost...oops) so we walked 30 min to the capella, the map wasn't there, so we walked 30 minutes to a members house to see if the map was there, it wasn't, so we walked 30 minutes back to the capella to catch a bus to our next appointment. i thought i knew which bus to take but i definitely didnt because we ended up on the wrong one and in another area an hour away, so we road the but back around to our area and got of the same spot that we got on and walked an hour to our Appointment... yikes. lol. To top it all off, I spent the rest of our night in an evangelical church again. I told our bible basher investigators that if they would let our member take them to see the sao paulo temple that i would go to their church again... lets just say it was just as ridiculous as the first time, except this time they were speaking in tongues. It sounded exactly like in harry potter, the second movie, when harry is speaking in parseltongue... and everyone in the congregation is yelling amen! and hallelujah! and glory to god! Once again I am so grateful for the gospel when I can truly feel the whisperings of the spirit. We also met a family to teach! Our fabulous ward missionaries introduced us to their neighbors, husband and wife and 2 kids. They're great. The wife said that she was already frequenting a church, but that lately she had been feeling that there is something missing... THE BOOK OF MORMON! :D The lesson was awesome and I could feel the spirit really strong. and we are going back to teach them this week!

Friday wasn't too excited, but I did get to learn how to make some great Brazilian food when we went to lunch! So good. Friday night we had a lesson with G just to see how he was doing before his baptism on saturday. He told us that he was so excited he went and got a haircut and invited his whole family!

Saturday we had our baptism! :D Baptismal days are always really hard for me because I always just want to skip right to the baptism! We made a bunch of visits in the morning (which was so HOT) and then made our way home to freshen up and put on another layer of deodorant... lol. We had to have the baptism in another capella because our capella was hosting a youth dance. G brought his entire family and girlfriend, who cried, and were all so sweet... we'll work on them next ;) 

Yesterday, G was confirmed! He bought new clothes for church and looked so snappy! It was so precious and such a happy moment. We had a meeting at the stake center with all of the priesthood leaders, but our district leader forgot to tell us that they rescheduled one with the missionaries... so just imagine all of the stake priesthood leaders in a meeting and two sister missionaries as well. how embarrassing. we ended up leaving after the opening hymn when we realize that no other missionaries were coming... oops again... That night we had a family home evening with some members and investigators who we are teaching how to read! I'll update you more on that next time, but it was great!

I think thats all for now... Be good and don't forget to share your testimony!

Com amor,

sister hargrove